What a weekend!! WBC 2000 will go Into the history books as
one of the greatest Diplomacy events ever. As hosts to
World DipCon X and DipCon XXXIII, my associates Edi Birsan, Dan
Mathias, and I pulled out all the stops in an effort to make
it worthy of the name. With a total of 141 players involved in
58 games It was one of the largest Dip events ever In North America.
In addition to players from all over the US and Canada there
were 18 players from overseas representing Australlia,
New Zealand, France, Belgium, United Kingdom, Ireland, Norway,
and Israel. The quality of the play was absolutely unprecedented.
The combined attraction of WBC/WDC/DC reached across time as
well as distance. John Smythe, the first person to ever win a
Diplomacy tournament (I970), and Mike Rocamora -- one
of the greats from the early 70's, were in
attendance. To add the icing and candles to the cake, Allan Calhamer,
the inventor of THE game joined us to speak to us about his new
book and to play some Dip. Diplomacy at this year's WBC
was way over the top.

As In past years, we gave out
our array of special awards, beginning with 'The Hammered Award.
It is given to the player who, in the opinion of the GM, showed
the greatest amount of courage and fortitude despite getting
"hammered" round after round. This year the Award went
to Tim Miller. In Round 1 as Austria, he went from five centers
to three in '03 and was eliminated ln '04. In Round 2 playing
England, he was one of the victims of this year's Golden Blade
recipient, losing his final two centers in '05. On Saturday morning
in Round 3 he drew Turkey, a position known for its defensive
qualities. Nevertheless, he was eliminated by '03. After all
that, he was there ready to play at 8:OOAM Sunday. His dedication
was rewarded by getting to play through 1907, when his last two
English supply centers fell.

This year's "Golden Blade
Award" winner was Chris Kulander. Playing Russia on the
#1 board in Round 2, he stabbed three of his neighbors at the
same time, aquiring a total of six supply centers In 1906. Impressive
as that is, consider that prior to the stab he had only seven
centers. With this one move, he almost doubled the size of his
position.

The WBC 2000 Best Country Awards went to:

Vick Hall

Simon Buton

Brian Dennehy

Sean Cable

Yarden Livnat

Nathen Cockrill

M. Franceschini

Austria

England

France

Germany

Italy

Russia

Turkey

2w9

W 18

W 18

W 18

3w13

W 17

2w15

Simon Buton from the UK scoring a 3w-12 as Russia in Round
1, an 18 center win as England in Round 2, a 3w-14 as Turkey
in Round 3, and a 2w-13 in the final round as Italy for a total
of 123 points is the WBC 2000/WDCX/DCXXXIII Champion. Thanks
to David Norman we have a victim's eye view of the Champion's
all important English win:

The game started with France and Germany planning to attack
England. But then England told Germany that he didn't feel happy,
and was opening the Channel. Germany reconsidered, and decided
to attack France in the Fall. England and France bounced in ENG.

In F1901, Austria and Turkey kept me out of Rum, and showed
that they were also intending to work together. And so the initial
alliances were set, with little Jimmy not doing much in between.
England and Germany were making good progress against France,
while I was slowly being pushed back by Austria and Turkey. My
line of A(Mos) s A(Ukr), A(War) s A(Ukr) held them back for a
while, but eventually Austria moved up into Sil and then took
War.

At this point, Turkey decided to stab Austria, and I was only
too happy to have the pressure relieved. With Turkey doing well
and having no fleets in the South, my only choice was to join
him on the attack of Austria. Meanwhile in the North, France
had been eliminated, and England had turned on Germany. He was
starting to look rather threatening. So once Austria was out,
with me holding my home centers and Rumania, and Turkey holding
the rest, we started to talk about stalemate lines. We initially
included Italy in the line, but Turkey decided he could hold
England off in the Med without Italy's help, and so took him
out. With England only having two fleets in the Med at this point,
it looked a fairly safe bet, but it did mean that England got
Tunis.

I started to draw diagrams of where lines could be formed,
and worked out who could hold which centers. The most likely
line was one with me on four centers (Mos, War, Sev and Rum),
holding Northern Russia and Prussia, Germany holding Ber and
Mun, and Turkey holding the Med and providing the support Germany
needed in Munich.

And so with the game heading to a 16-12-4-2, E-T-R-G, Turkey
decided he wanted a two-way draw rather than a three-way, and
so stabbed Germany for Munich, and me for Sev and Rum. He and
England now had the 29 centres required to call a two-way, but
he hadn't realised that there is something else you need for
a two-way, and that is for neither power to have a forced solo.
Turkey didn't have nearly enough armies to hold the line by himself,
and in case it wasn't clear enough already, Germany and I turned
round to stop him taking the rest of our centers, rather than
defend against England. Without the support to keep Munich, England
had taken it that Fall, and with Munich gone, Berlin was the
18th the following year, and was forced.

Turkey made a last attempt to salvage something from the game,
and publicly said that if England was going to win, then he was
going to try to get the other 16. So I asked Germany across the
table to support me in Warsaw, to which he agreed, and
then asked England not to cut the support, to which he also agreed,
and Turkey just looked like we had knocked the last bit of fight
out of him. So Simon walked away with an 18-15-1 win and ,as
it turns out, the Championship.

WBC / WDC X / DC XXXIII Team Tournament

We had 19 - four-player teams entered for this event which
was run congruent to the Saturday round. The winning team with
71 points was the "Best Asians" nominally from the
UK. Oihon Bodaranalbe spearheaded the team's winning effort with
a three-way -15 center England for 26 points. Simon Buton, the
Individual champion, chipped In 24 points with 14 centers in
a three-way as Turkey. Chelan Radia added 12 points with a four-way
- 8 center Austria, while Vick Hall finished wilh 6
centers In a four-way as Russia for 10 points.

WBC / WDC X / DC XXXIII Escalation
Tournament

There is really good news and not so good news regarding this
attempt to introduce this two-player Dip varient at WBC. The
really good news was that those who played it, all reported it
is a blast. The not so good news is that only nine players tried
it out. Based on his two five-point wins, John Quarto is the
Escalation champion. Brian Ecton came in second.

Some comments and reflections ...

Mike Hall, Canada -
My comments about WBC/WDC would have to center on the great turn
out from people from all over the World. You were able to draw
a huge crowd of overseas people and put on a great tourney, WELL
DONE. I think the best part of the whole
event (other then that great wine you shared with me Saturday
night!! ) was the chats people had before and after the gaming,
either late into the night in the bar talking about Diplomacy
or other topics like kids, family and travels. Or over breakfast
in
the morning trying to get something into you before another round.
This made the whole experience a well rounded thing. Most of
us had only seen a name on a computer screen but until WBC/WDC
we never got to meet FTF. Names like Brandon
Clarke, David Norman and that whole crew from Ireland/UK what
a bunch!! You host Yanks were a real friendly group to say the
least. I had a great time and I am sure everyone else did as
well.

Edi Birsan, California -
I go to the World DipCon to meet players from all over the world.
This year I was greatly pleased to meet again those players who
I had seen on their home turf in Europe and Australia now on
mine. The gathering at Baltimore was the greatest collection
of world class star players ever assembled with national and
regional champions from as far away as New Zealand and Belgium.
The diviersity in players was excellent in all categories with
John Smythe (the first person to ever win a Diplomacy
Tournament (1970) and young Jimmy Levay making his second tournament
appearance having started as a pre-teen terror. Having the game's
inventor, Allan Calhamer present and playing was a great bonus
and gave the hobby a chance to thank him in person for the fine
gift his creation has given to all of us. I particularly enjoyed
playing with him on the final round where he steadfastly went
on a binge of center grabbing regardless of diplomatic consequences
and got away with it. The number of players in the multiple rounds
was greater than any North American Tournament for the last 20
years. Having been to many of the tournaments over the last 33
years, this was one of the most memorable of the events in which
I had the pleasure to participate .

Brandon Clarke,
New Zealand -
I was playing with Allan Calhamer in Baltimore. I'm not sure
if it was in the Gunboat game or in Round 4. Anyway, Al commented
to me that when he made the game he envisaged the Army blocks
being stood on their ends (as is the common practice the world
over for indicating a unit supporting) and thought people would
tip them on their long sides to indicate a supporting unit (as
most people lay them on their long sides normally). He said he
never even considered that people wouldn't stand them on their
short ends, and when he first saw this practice he was quite
stunned.

... and the big picture from Buz Eddy, Washington State
-
The Garden Room at Hunt Valley Inn is fairly good sized, there
were about a dozen banquet round tables set up plus three or
four 8' straight banquet tables. When the board assignments were
read, it seemed jammed and very, very crowded. TD Jim Yerkey
then made his welcoming remarks and shared the happy news that
six additional tables were available out in the hallway.

My board assignment had me with six people I had not met,
and only one familiar name from my rating list. I drew France
and Al Ugaz drew England. I knew he had done fairly decently
before. The game was E/F and R/T taking out the three in the
middle and declaring a great four-way draw. Oh well, I had three
eliminations in Columbus (by the record), and a single draw in
Chapel Hill. I can't do worse than my prior best.

I started finding people I had known about for years but met
for the first time. Jim Burgess, may actually be younger than
my own age 60, but it seems like he's been around as long as
I have. He is responsible for a publication called The Abysinian
Prince, a quality piece of work. In the postal hobby 7/8th
or more of the publications call themselves zines, but Jim to
his dying breath will insist that he publishes a szine.

Phil Reynolds is a fellow that likes to write as much as I
do. In one issue of the Postal Publication commentary Zine
Register, Phil and I provided nearly 2/3 of the reviews.
We spent some time talking about when Postal Dip was healthier
than it is today.

Mike Barno is a name that was most active in the 1980s. But
Edi Birsan has prevailed upon him to serve as webmaster for the
Diplomatic Corps that is attempting to provide some structure
to international Diplomacy. In the spirit of true postal diplomats,
Mike and I spent time debating whether the current hoax (revelation)
was true or not. Is Sara Reichart a man named Harry?? I think
some of Sara's postal victims would feel better if she were a
he.

When I first started my attempts at rating Diplomacy
results the first name that popped to the top of the postal list
was John Smythe. He was winning consistently through the 1960s.
I have not seen John's name active in any form of Diplomacy
for two decades, but he put up a solo against a board that included
Steve Koehler and John Quarto. Koehler is a veteran tournament
player with considerable success, and Quarto was the top rated
player on my list at year end last year. Its good to see that
us senior citizens still have a little of what it takes. John
placed 8th.

In Round 2, I met two people that I had previously only heard
about. Carl Willner was Italy, and Yarden Livnat was Turkey.
Willner is an attorney that I think has as many games as anyone
in my rating records. The name Livnat came to my attention earlier
in the year as the runnerup at Denver. I learned that Yarden
was a post doctoral student at the University of Utah, and an
Israeli national.I also learned he was a powerhouse, take charge
Diplomat. I'm Russia, he's Turkey. OK he says, open Sev - Arm,
I'll po it in the fall, retreat OTB and build an Army. I sort
of like R/T, and hearing nothing from the Austrian said OK, sure,
why not? I was ready to go, and be the unimaginitive rock of
an ally, but so was Italy, Carl Willner, and Yarden found me
most expendable. I smiled when I showed up later to learn that
Italy had also become expendable. Livnat finished sixth. He's
about 200 points off the pace for the 2000 Grand Prix.

I play some e-mail on AOL and found some of my online acquaintances.
I knew Scott Morris and Eric Grinell from Chapel Hill, where
Eric brought some homemade beer that was high octane stuff. I
met Monte Carlisle and Adam Silverman. I'm currently in a game
with Adam. The one player that I have played with in AOL that
I didn't meet was
Don Scheifler. He's been good consistently on AOL and managed
a ninth place finish.

My third round game was probably the one I enjoyed the most.
As Italy, I have Vick Hall in Russia, he's a Brit with a good
powerful style and finished 7th , Mike McMillie and Jim Yerkey
in Germany and England. This was Jim's only game, he was
needed as a fill-in. The round was a major board assignment headache,
as the team competition required no two of the four-
person teams to be on the same board. The Austrian was named
William Fuller. He told me I and A can't fight or neither survives.
Then opened Tri - Ven. It took me a long time to exorcize this
demon possession, at this point Eric Momsen in Turkey was helping
himself to Balkan dots. I finished the ethnic clensing of Italy
by convoying the last Austrian unit to Syria. where it died.
Turkey and I sailed west, Constans Thibald had fought a "glorious
war against Mike McMillie in Germany and when we ripped the south,
it was E/G solid in the west. Turkey started nibbling at Russian
holdings, but Vick Hall broke off
his fight with E/G and defended well enough. France wound up
with two units and I had four when the bell rang. I ran afoul
of Jim's 29 votes declares a result. If France and I stuck together
we could make it a seven-way draw, which meant nothing in the
tournament, but is the difference between a draw and a loss which
is important in my rating system. He said he was voting to exclude
me because Germany asked him to, and it had been a "glorious"
war. My four units lose, Mike's five units win. Hey, thems the
rules.

I missed the meetings, because I had to run to the airport
to replace a lost "paper" ticket. The tales of the
procedings that I heard suggested it may have been worth not
being there. But it did mean that the Articles and By-Laws of
the Federation had to wait for another time.

The Saturday morning round was 9AM. Somehow ,I missed that
the Sunday morning round was earlier. I was sitting in the restaurant
for about 30 minutes and walked to the Garden room to check in
only to learn I was too late. I made a few attempts to recruit
a board, but didn't really get close. Larry Peery didn't care
to, Dan Mathias didn't care to, they would have to fill it out,
but not their first choice.

So I went to work. First I got the Origins recorsds from Dan
Mathias. I produce the tournament cross-table, and made copies
for Bruce Reiff and Dan Mathias. That was truly fortunate, because
I left my copy in Baltimore, and Bruce was able to provide me
one to rate and post the results when I got back to Seattle.
I began to recap the WDC. Folks came by and saw I was working
with the Tournament cards, but they respected Jim's request that
the information remain secret until play was complete. I met
one of the top rated Tea and Knife fellows, Hudson Defoe. He
finished 13th. I said a lot of you Tea and Knife guys do well
-- you must sharpen each other. He smiled, doubled his fist,
and said yeah we sharpen each other a lot.

Tom Kobrin came by. Tom has been near or at the top of my
ratings for ten years. He was commenting on the fact that he
was listening to people look at my display rating compilation
and find themselves and take an interest. Tom also told me that
in one game the fact that he was top rated was used against him
to try to organize opposition. That made me happy, I think real
championship play is performed by those that flourish in the
spotlight. Tom, Chris Martin, David Hood, and Mark Franceschini
come to mind.

What did I think most impressive about 2000 WDC? The pre-tournament
publicity and organization. The organization of fund-raising
to host the foreign players, the continual stream of announcements
from Edi Birsan, and Dan Mathias, and Jim Yerkey, and the headlining
of this event in the BPA news releases. There was a sense of
"this is the place to be". Which
resulted in 141 players. There is a legend that the first Origins
in Baltimore had 200 players, but I've never seen a player list,
or Board count, or anything but an unsupported statement to that
effect. So unless there is really some evidence developed otherwise,
I'm content to label this the all-time biggest and most successful
Diplomacy event in North American history. Thanks to all
that helped make it happen.

GM's Comments -

For me personally, there were
many things which stood out. I had to fill a board on Saturday
and got to play against Vick Hall and Thiboult Constans, two
of Europe's best. I got to meet with many of the overseas players
and compare notes with them about running Dip tournaments. The
return of Mike Rocamora, who 20+ years ago taught me some tough
lessons on how to win, was a treat. Foremost among all these
was the presence of Mr Calhamer. Meeting him, talking with him,
and having him play at WBC was quite an honor. To those who have
not been captured by the "art" of Diplomacy
this is probably not something which is understandable. To us
"Diplomats" it was a magic moment .

There are many people I need to thank for helping put this
event together. In no particular order: Don Greenwood and everyone
at BPA who were so patient and helpful, and my associates; Edi
Birsan, who put so much effort into advertising and contacting
Dip players all over the world and getting them to attend; the
folks at Hasbro for their support; David Hood, who, despite being
a threat to take the WDC championship home with him, sat out
a round because we had an uneven number of players; David Norman,
without whom the paper work would never have gotten done; my
friend Mark Franceschini who filled in and helped out where ever
he was needed; and, of course, my friend Don Mathias, who went
way above and beyond the call of duty to coordinate housing and
transportation for the overseas players, and who also sat out
a round. To everyone involved, winners and victims alike, give
yourselves a pat on the back (assuming the stab wounds have healed).
This was your success as well.

One final note, we play great Dip at WBC every year. We would
love for everyone to come back. Particularly all of you first
timers from the Mid-Atlantic area. If you had a good time, join
us again next year

WBC 2000 --World DipCon X -- DipCon
XXXIII Final Standings

Key to Game Results: e - eliminated,
s - survived, v - voluntarily withdrew to make even board
#w - participated in a draw with # members
W - Win,
The Number following each of these is the number of supply centers
held at the end of the game.